How does the Swiss economy develop on a daily basis? Under the extraordinary circumstances caused by the Covid-19 pandemic, the economy is changing faster than usual but standard economic indicators cannot capture this. Indicators such as consumer sentiment index, GDP, or private consumption become available with a lag of up to several months.
As a solution, we provide a set of economic indicators for Switzerland based on Google search trends. These indicators are updated daily and provide policymakers and business leaders with timely information about the Swiss economy. Here you find more information on how to use our indicators and you can download the data.
The indicator for Perceived Economic Situation includes search terms that reflect people’s worries about the economy. For instance, people then google “economic crisis” (Wirtschaftskrise).
The category Watches and Jewellery includes stores and brands selling luxurious watches and jewellery goods and related, more general search terms for luxury consumer goods.
The category Mobility includes search terms related to ground transportation: For instance, checking the railway schedule or calling a taxi.
The category Travel Abroad includes search terms used to book flights and holidays.
The category Cultural Events includes search terms related to concerts, theatres, cinema and ticket providers for such events.
The category Gardening and Home Improvement includes stores selling materials for home improvement such as building materials, garden accessories and electrical supplies.
The category Clothing and Shoes includes clothing and shoe stores as well as a general search terms related to buying clothes and shoes. We found that people directly google for the brands they like. Note: the searchword “zalando” was not included because Zalando was not available in Switzerland before 2011.
The category Food Delivery includes search terms related to take away and ordering pizza.
Official economic statistics are usually released with a considerable lag. For example, the consumer sentiment index, GDP, or private consumption data become available with a lag of up to several months. The pace at which economic conditions are currently changing, however, requires more timely economic indicators in order to monitor and forecast economic activity. Economists have come up with different innovative ways to monitor the economy based on daily data, e.g. using daily electricity consumption.
To provide a set of timely economic indicators, we source Google Trends data. These indicators are available on a daily basis. The idea is that people’s searches on Google tell a lot about their perception of the state of the economy and demand for certain products and services.
When people become unemployed or fear they might lose their job, for example, they start searching for words like “arbeitslos” (unemployed). When people want to buy clothes, they likely type the name of fashion stores like “H&M” or “Zara”. Changes in these searches will then tell us something about unemployment or the demand for clothing.
These indicators provide insights about the abrupt economic changes we are currently experiencing. They will likely be among the first to capture changes in consumption once measures to fight the spread of Covid-19 are lifted step by step. They will thus help to monitor the recovery and possibly indicate lasting changes in consumption habits.
Our main indicator on the Perceived Economic Situation captures macroeconomic fluctuations. The other indicators focus on private consumption because i) of its overall importance for economic growth: private consumption makes up over 50% of Swiss GDP; ii) in this crisis, private consumption is hit hardest: due to closures of restaurants, stores, cinemas etc. private consumption is severely limited. This situation is very different to a financial crisis like the one that occurred in 2008/2009 and mainly hit the supply side of the Swiss economy.
To ensure that our combinations of keywords lead to meaningful results, we compare our indicators to existing measures, namely the consumer sentiment index, GDP, and components of private consumption expenditure whenever they provide a meaningful comparison. Our indicators broadly coincide with existing economic time series over the past 13 years, including the recession in 2009. However, note that our indicators do not attempt to replicate or replace any existing time series.
The figure below shows how our main indicator on the perceived economic situation compares to quarterly GDP growth in Switzerland and the consumer confidence index. For comparison, we have aggregated our indicator to quarters. In this figure, the last observation of our indicators is based on Google searches from January to March 2020, the first quarter of the year. This explains why the drop looks less dramatic than when looking at daily data.
For some indicators, such as Cultural Events – which includes demand for restaurants, cinemas, concerts etc. – or Gardening and Home Improvement (aka do-it-yourself articles), there is no preexisting, well-established indicator to compare our search-based indicators with. Nevertheless these indicators appear meaningful, as we are observing substantial changes in searches for these goods and services compared to normal times. These indicators will therefore provide valuable information on whether the economy is going back to normal as lock-down measures are lifted. In the beginning, some people, especially people in risk groups, may still be be reluctant to go, for example, to restaurants or stroll around shopping malls because they are afraid of contracting the virus.
The relationship between these search-based indicators and economic activity seems apparent. We believe that these indicators will provide useful during the whole economic roller-coaster ride that lies ahead of us, during the current downturn as well as the upswing(s) when things go slowly back to (a new?) normal.
Note however, that the relationship between Google searches for specific keywords and real economic activity may change over time. First, the popularity of specific internet platforms and online stores can change, and in that case Google searches as well as actual consumption behavior will change too.
Second, this crisis is very different to previous ones as private demand drops largely because of mandated closures of restaurants, cinemas and stores to fight the spread of Covid-19.
Third, the crisis itself might lead to permanent changes in search behavior. For example, containment measures may lead to a permanent increase of the proportion of the population doing grocery shopping online. While there are currently two major supermarkets offering online shopping, people might start to search more and more for other shops offering this service.
03. September 2020
Alexander Götz
Am 27. August 2020 verkündete das Staatssekretariat für Wirtschaft (SECO) den historischen Rückgang der Schweizer Wirtschaftsleistung während des zweiten Quartals 2020 gegenüber dem Vorquartal um 8.2%. Die Ökonomen des SECO erklären in ihrer Konjunkturnotiz, dass insbesondere der private Konsum einen noch nie dagewesenen Einbruch erlitten hat. In vergangenen Krisen hat sich gezeigt, dass der private Konsum die Wirtschaft vor schlimmeren Entwicklungen, welche zumeist von rückläufige Investitionen angeheizt werden, bewahrt hat. In der gegenwärtigen Krise haben lediglich die Veränderungen der Staatsausgaben sich positiv auf die BIP-Veränderung ausgewirkt. Der Aussenhandel brach ebenso ein, da wichtige Handelspartner der Schweiz auch von Restriktionen betroffen waren. Weil der private Konsum den grössten Anteil aller BIP-Komponenten darstellt, wirken sich dessen Schwankungen besonders stark auf die Wirtschaftsleistung aus. So trägt der Konsumrückgang bedeutend zum BIP-Rückgang bei und konnte folglich seiner Rolle als Garant von Stabilität nicht nachkommen.
Schon seit Ausbruch der Pandemie und während des Lockdowns spekulieren US-amerikanische Ökonomen, dass die bisherigen Konsumgewohnheiten sich nicht nur kurzfristig sondern auch mittel- und langfristig verändern könnten. Insbesondere die Nutzung von Online-Shops für alltägliche Einkäufe habe durch die Ausgeh-Restriktionen einen weiteren Schub erhalten, welche durchaus eine Zeitenwende im Einzelhandel einläuten könnte.
Ob sich aber die Zusammensetzung des Konsumkorbs mit den Einkaufsmöglichkeiten, z.B. eben über Online-Shops statt im Supermarkt, verändert, ist eine andere Frage. Ob und wie sich die Nachfrage nach Gütern verändert, lässt sich mit einem Blick auf einzelne Konsumrubriken genauer erforschen. Im Folgenden wollen wir uns Konsumrubriken widmen, die zu den alltäglichsten des Lebens gehören: dem Essen.
Mit trendEcon können wir die Suchanfragen nach spezifischen Konsumgütern, welche mutmasslich durch die Pandemie und dem Lockdown beeinflusst wurden, genauer betrachten. Als Suchbegriffe haben wir die Begriffe «Restaurant» und «Bar» sowie «Rezept» und «Sauerteig» gewählt.
Das erste Begriffspaar («Restaurant» und «Bar»; gestrichelte Linien) spiegelt Suchanfragen wider, die mit dem Ausgehen zusammenhängen. Betrachten wir den zeitlichen Verlauf der Suchanfragen, fällt auf, dass die beiden Begriffe während des Lockdowns kaum mehr gegoogelt wurden und erst wieder gegen Anfang Juni 2020 das übliche Niveau erlangten. Interessanterweise sehen wir auch, dass der Begriff «Restaurant» nach den Lockerungsphasen sogar stärker gesucht wurde als vor dem Lockdown. Dies kann einerseits ein Kompensationseffekt sein, wobei man sich danach danach sehnte sich bekochen zu lassen anstatt selbst zu kochen. Aber auch eine weit verbreitete Unsicherheit ist denkbar, so dass wir in der Schweiz vor einem Restaurant viel eher nachsehen, ob dieses überhaupt geöffnet ist. In der angesprochenen Konjunkturnotiz berichtet das SECO ebenfalls von Kompensationseffekten im Konsum aus, rechnet aber nicht mit einer vollständigen Kompensation der Ausfälle der ersten Jahreshälfte.
Die anderen Begriffe («Rezept» und «Sauerteig», durchgezogene Linien) stehen für Aktivitäten, die wir mit dem Kochen zuhause in Verbindung bringen. Die Entwicklung der Suchanfrage «Rezept» lässt erkennen, dass es typischerweise während der Festtage im Dezember ins Suchfeld eingegeben wird. Der Lockdown scheint aber aus den Restaurantgänger*innen Köch*innen gemacht zu haben. Erstaunlicherweise haben Schweizer*innen sich auch Zeit für aufwändigere Verfahren wie die Kultivierung von Sauerteigen genommen (NZZ, Juni 2020). So dokumentiert die Zeitreihe über das Suchverhalten nach «Sauerteig» einen gewaltigen Hype zwischen März und Mai, der nach den ersten Lockerungen sein jähes Ende fand, was daran liegen könnte, dass Arbeitnehmende ihre Home-Offices wieder verliessen.
Ein Blick auf den heutigen Stand zeigt, dass die erläuterten Suchbegriffe wieder alte Niveaus erreicht haben. Sorgen über die Auswirkungen der zweiten Infektionswelle oder Jobsicherheit können sich jedoch auch in den kommenden Wochen auf das Konsumverhalten auswirken. Es bleibt also zu beobachten, ob der Konsum im kommenden Quartal die rückläufige Wirtschaftsleistung zu stabilisieren vermag. Wir sind jedoch skeptisch, ob der Sauerteig Teil dieser nahen Zukunft sein wird.
26. August 2020
Stefan Legge
Viele der Aufgaben, die die Menschen tagtäglich erledigen müssen, haben sich seit Jahrhunderten nicht verändert: Essen besorgen, einen bequemen Schlafplatz finden, Verletzungen und Krankheiten behandeln oder von einem Ort zum anderen gelangen. Der einflussreiche Wirtschaftstheoretiker Clayton M. Christensen hat auf der Grundlage dieser Tatsache eine Theorie der zu erledigenden Aufgaben (jobs to be done aufgestellt. Seine wichtigste Beobachtung ist, dass sich die Werkzeuge und Verfahren, die die Menschen zur Erledigung dieser Aufgaben einsetzen, viel häufiger ändern als die Aufgaben selbst.
Was die Mobilität betrifft, so wechselten die Menschen ihr primäres Verkehrsmittel immer dann, wenn neue Technologien - Zug, Auto, Flugzeug - es ihnen erlaubten und Anreize dazu boten. In jüngster Zeit wurden wir Zeugen eines weiteren Grundes, warum die Menschen die Art und Weise, wie sie von A nach B kamen, änderten: Die Covid-19-Pandemie machte einige Transportmittel weniger attraktiv. Darüber hinaus reisten viele Menschen aufgrund von Gesundheitsbedenken weit weniger.
Aktuelle Daten der KOF deuten darauf hin, dass sich die durchschnittlich zurückgelegte Entfernung (veranschaulicht durch den Mobilitätsindex) von ihrem Tiefpunkt Ende März weitgehend erholt hat. Dies erlaubt es uns, interessante Fragen zu stellen: Hat die Pandemie zu nachhaltigen Veränderungen bei der Wahl der Verkehrsmittel geführt? Benutzen Menschen weiterhin Fahrräder und Autos statt der öffentlichen Verkehrsmittel?
Daten von trendEcon geben darüber Aufschluss. Wir beobachten, wie sich die Google-Suchfrequenzen in der jüngeren Vergangenheit entwickelt haben und können sie mit den Werten von 2019 oder 2018 vergleichen. So können wir prüfen, ob die Schweizer Bürgerinnen und Bürger ihre Mobilitätspräferenzen nur vorübergehend oder dauerhaft verschoben haben. In der Abbildung unten illustrieren wir die Ergebnisse für die Suchbegriffe “Velo kaufen”, “Auto kaufen”, “Busticket” sowie “Zugticket”. Ausserdem zeigen wir unseren Index für Mobilität zusammen mit jenem der KOF.
Die Daten deuten auf eine deutliche kurzfristige Auswirkung von Covid-19 hin: Das Interesse an Fahrrädern erreichte einen Höhepunkt, während die Suche nach öffentlichen Verkehrsmitteln stark zurückging. Interessanter sind die nachhaltigen Folgen dieses Schocks. Zwar ist die Analyse zum jetzigen Zeitpunkt noch früh - die Pandemie ist nicht vorbei - aber wir sehen weiterhin ein erhöhtes Interesse an Fahrrädern. Es bleibt abzuwarten, ob sich dies in den kommenden Monaten fortsetzt. Auch der negative Schock für die öffentlichen Verkehrsmittel (Busse und Züge) dauert noch an: das Interesse am Öffentlichen Verkehr ist im Vergleich zur Zeit vor Corona deutlich zurückgegangen.
Covid-19 verursachte einige dramatische Veränderungen im Leben der Menschen und in ihren Mobilitätspräferenzen. Die von trendEcon bereitgestellten Daten bieten aktuelle Einblicke in die wichtigsten Mobilitätstrends.
24. August 2020
Stefan Legge
Am 12. August 2020 hat der Bundesrat angekündigt, dass ab Oktober wieder Grossanlässe mit mehr als tausend Teilnehmenden zugelassen werden. Damit wurden die im März verhängten COVID-19-bezogenen Einschränkungen erneut gelockert. Viele Unternehmen, Sportvereine und Organisatoren von Veranstaltungen waren erleichtert, endlich Licht am Ende des Tunnels zu sehen.
Aber nur weil Grossveranstaltungen erlaubt sind, heißt das noch lange nicht, dass die Menschen sie auch tatsächlich besuchen werden. Die Zahl der täglich neuen COVID-19-Fälle ist seit Wochen im Aufwärtstrend. Viele - aber nicht alle - Menschen in der Schweiz versuchen nach wie vor, Grossanlässe zu vermeiden. Eine US-amerikanische Studie zeigt, dass die Wiedereröffnung von Restaurants nach der Schliessung die Kunden glauben lässt, dass es sicher war, wieder auswärts zu essen. In ähnlicher Weise kann das Zulassen von Grossveranstaltungen ein Signal der Sicherheit setzen. Hat die jüngste Ankündigung also Einzelpersonen dazu veranlasst, ihre Meinung zu ändern?
Mithilfe von trendEcon können wir sehen, wie sich die Google-Suchfrequenzen in den vergangenen Tagen, Wochen oder Monaten entwickelt haben. Als Suchbegriffe verwenden wir “Festival”, “Tickets kaufen”, “Hallenstadion” (eine Mehrzweckanlage in Zürich), “Letzigrund” (Stadion in Zürich), sowie “Konzert”.
Für keines der Stichworte deuten die Daten auf eine positive Wirkung der jüngsten Ankündigung hin. Es scheint, dass die Schweizerinnen und Schweizer sich bisher nicht beeilt haben, Veranstaltungen zu finden und Tickets zu kaufen. Für diese verhaltene Reaktion kann es viele Gründe geben: Die Bevölkerung ist nach wie vor besorgt über das Virus (die Zahl der Suchanfragen nach “Corona” oder “Corona Symptomen” bleibt auf hohem Niveau stabil), und die wahrgenommene wirtschaftliche Situation ist nach wie vor schlechter als vor dem Ausbruch der Pandemie Ende Februar. Darüber hinaus zögern die Organisatoren von Grossveranstaltungen immer noch, für 2020 zu planen. Das Hallenstadion Zürich führt derzeit nur sieben Veranstaltungen für den Rest des Jahres auf.
Die kommenden Wochen werden zeigen, ob die Nachfrage nach Grossanlässen steigt, je näher die Schweiz der Wiederaufnahme von Grossanlässen im Oktober kommt. Wenn nicht, wird das Licht am Ende des Tunnels vielleicht doch nicht allzu hell sein.
25. Mai 2020
Die erste Jahreshälfte 2020 darf schon jetzt als historisch betrachtet werden. Selten zuvor sind Volkswirtschaften in derart kurzer Zeit so sehr eingebrochen wie jetzt. Infolge von COVID-19 und den diesbezüglichen staatlichen Massnahmen steigen praktisch überall die Arbeitslosenzahlen rapide an. Die wirtschaftliche Leistung gemessen am Bruttoinlandsprodukt (BIP) fällt stärker als wir es seit Jahrzehnten gesehen haben. Nach wie vor herrscht jedoch grosse Unsicherheit darüber, wie dramatisch der wirtschaftliche Einbruch wird und wie rasch sich Volkswirtschaften von der Krise erholen werden.
In der Schweiz ist ein Rückgang des BIP um rund sechs Prozent zu erwarten (Seco, April 2020). Allerdings trifft dies nicht alle Sektoren der Wirtschaft gleichmässig. Restaurants oder auch der Flughafen Zürich sind ungleich härter betroffen als beispielsweise Supermärkte oder die Pharmabranche. Während die Extrema recht offensichtlich sind, bleiben jedoch viele Fragen offen.
Wie schnell steigt beispielsweise die Nachfrage nach langlebigen Konsumgütern wieder? In Rezessionen sparen Konsumentinnen und Konsumenten insbesondere bei Kleidung, Möbeln oder Autos. Ausgaben in diesen Bereichen lassen sich leichter aufschieben, weshalb diese Branchen sehr pro-zyklisch sind: In der Rezession leiden sie besonders – und mit ihnen die Werbebranche und in nächster Instanz Zeitungen, welche weniger Werbeanzeigen verkaufen. Somit ist die Nachfrage nach Kleidung oder Autos über Zweit- und Drittrundeneffekte auch für viele andere Industrien wichtig.
Sowohl für die Politik als auch für Unternehmen stellt die hohe Unsicherheit ein Problem da. Wie viel staatliche Unterstützung braucht es und wo ist sie am nötigsten? Ab wann können sich Firmen wieder auf steigende Nachfrage und damit Umsätze einstellen?
Daten können uns helfen, solche Fragen besser zu beantworten. Allerdings müssen diese vielfach erst aufbereitet und graphisch veranschaulicht werden. Die von uns neu geschaffene Plattform trendEcon.org setzt sich genau dies zum Ziel. Jeden Tag suchen Schweizerinnen und Schweizer auf Google nach unzähligen Begriffen. Via Google Trends lässt sich für jeden einsehen, welche Begriffe derzeit sehr häufig gesucht werden. Illustrativ ist ein Blick auf die Begriffe «WC Papier» sowie «Rezession»:
Es zeigt sich hier anschaulich, wie ab der zweiten Märzwoche die Suchanfragen nach «Rezession» stiegen und viele Menschen Mitte März aufgrund einer kurzfristigen Knappheit an WC-Papier danach im Internet gesucht haben. Die Sorge um das WC-Papier ist rasch verflogen, aber das Thema Rezession ist nach wie vor sehr präsent, wenn auch auf einem tieferen Niveau.
Diese Beispiele verdeutlichen auch einige Probleme: Welche Suchbegriffe sind relevant und auf welche Weise können mehrere Begriffe kombiniert verwendet werden? Wie lassen sich die Daten sauber vergleichbar darstellen: was ist der sinnvolle Vergleichsmassstab?Diese Aspekte versuchen wir mit trendEcon zu adressieren, indem wir aus einer Vielzahl an möglichen Suchbegriffen die geeignetsten auswählen und die Daten ab Januar 2006 aufbereiten. Die Datenaufbereitung beinhaltet unter anderem eine saisonale Bereinigung ebenso wie die Berücksichtigung von Feiertagen.
Im Ergebnis zeigt trendEcon derzeit neben einem Krisenindex auch für mehrere Branchen die zeitliche Entwicklung auf. Unser Hauptindikator «Perceived Economic Situation» basiert auf den Google Suchanfragen in der Schweiz nach den Stichworten «Wirtschaftskrise», «Kurzarbeit», «arbeitslos» und «Insolvenz». Die darauf basierenden Daten liefern ein Bild davon ab, wie sehr sich die Menschen in der Schweiz um die wirtschaftliche Entwicklung sorgen. Je häufiger nach den vier Begriffen gesucht wird, desto schlechter die Einschätzung der aktuellen Situation. Graphisch zeigt sich deutlich der Einbruch ab Ende Februar und der Tiefpunkt kurz nach den Beschlüssen des Bundesrats vom 16. März 2020:
The indicator for Perceived Economic Situation includes search terms that reflect people’s worries about the economy. For instance, people then google “economic crisis” (Wirtschaftskrise).
Auffällig ist zudem, dass sich die Stimmung bereits wieder deutlich aufgehellt hat – wobei der Indikator nach wie vor unter dem langfristigen Niveau ist. Als sehr geeigneter Vergleich kann man die Daten aus dem Jahr 2019 heranziehen und erkennt, wie markant der Unterschied ist:
Neben der gesamtwirtschaftlichen Betrachtung bietet trendEcon auch eine Reihe von sektorspezifischen Indikatoren an. Dabei zeigt sich – als Bestätigung für die Qualität der Daten – der starke und anhaltende Einbruch der Reisebranche. Suchanfragen nach «Städtetrip», «Flug buchen» oder «günstige Flüge» sind nach wie vor viel geringer als zu Vor-Corona Zeiten:
The category Travel Abroad includes search terms used to book flights and holidays.
Einen ähnlichen und anhalten Einbruch sehen wir bei kulturellen Veranstaltungen. Im Gegensatz dazu ist die Nachfrage nach Essenslieferungen oder auch Baumärkten auf einem (positiven) Rekordstand.
Zusammengefasst lässt sich sagen, dass trendEcon eine Plattform für tagesaktuelle Informationen zum Zustand der schweizerischen Wirtschaft bietet. Wir werden in den kommenden Wochen weitere Suchbegriffe und (Sub-) Indikatoren hinzufügen, um das Angebot an Informationen stetig zu vergrössern. Ausserdem testen wir laufend die Nützlichkeit unserer Daten für die Prognose von volkswirtschaftlich relevanten Grössen. Sämtliche Daten sind frei zum Download verfügbar und der Code wird bald auf GitHub veröffentlicht.
September 3rd, 2020
Alexander Götz
On 27 August 2020, the State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (SECO) announced the historic 8.2% quarter-on-quarter decline in Swiss economic output during the second quarter of 2020. In their economic note, SECO’s economists explain that private consumption in particular has suffered an unprecedented slump. Past crises have shown that private consumption has saved the economy from worse developments, which are mostly fuelled by declining investments. During the current crisis, only changes in government expenditure have had a positive impact on the change in GDP. Foreign trade collapsed, as important trading partners of Switzerland were also affected by restrictions. Because private consumption represents the largest share of all GDP components, its fluctuations have a particularly strong impact on economic output. Therefore, the decline in consumption is a major contributor to the decline in GDP and has therefore been unable to fulfill its role as a guarantor of stability.
Ever since the outbreak of the pandemic and during the lockdown, US economists have been speculating that current consumption habits could change not only in the short term but also in the medium or long term. In particular, the use of online shops for everyday shopping has been given a further boost by the lockdown restrictions, which could well ring in a turnaround in the retail sector.
However, whether the composition of the consumer basket will change with shopping opportunities (e.g. via online shops instead of going to supermarkets) is another question. Whether and how the demand for goods changes can be investigated more closely by taking a look at specific consumer categories. In the following, we will look at consumption categories that are among the most everyday things in life: food.
With trendEcon we can take a closer look at the search queries for specific consumer goods that were presumably influenced by the pandemic and the lockdown. We have chosen the terms “restaurant” and “bar” as well as “recipe” and “sourdough” as search terms.
The first pair of terms (“Restaurant” and “Bar”; dashed lines) reflects search queries related to going out. If we look at the temporal course of the search queries, it is apparent that the two terms were hardly googled during the lockdown and only regained their usual level towards the beginning of June 2020. Interestingly, we also see that the term “Restaurant” was searched for even more after than before the lockdown. On the one hand, this can be a compensatory effect, where people longed to enjoy a prepared meal instead of cooking themselves. But also a widespread uncertainty is conceivable; we are much more likely to check whether a restaurant is even open before we visit it. In the above-mentioned economic note, the SECO also reports compensatory effects in private consumption, but does not expect full compensation for the losses of the first half of the year.
The other terms (“Rezept” and “Sauerteig”, solid lines) stand for activities that we associate with cooking at home. The development of search queries with “Rezept” shows that people typically look for recipes during holiday season in late December. However, the lockdown seems to have turned restaurant goers into cooks. Surprisingly, Swiss people have also taken time for more complex procedures such as the cultivation of sourdough (NZZ, June 2020). The time series on the search behavior for “Sauerteig” documents a huge hype between March and May, which came to an abrupt end after the first easing of the lockdown rules, which could be due to the fact that employees left their home offices again.
A look at the current state shows that the search terms shown have reached old levels again. Concerns about the effects of the second infection wave or job security may, however, continue to affect consumer behavior in the coming weeks. Therefore, we will see whether private consumption will be able to stabilize the declining economic output in the coming quarter. We are skeptical, however, whether sourdough will be part of this near future.
August 26th, 2020
Stefan Legge
Many of the tasks that people need to get done have not changed in centuries: getting food, finding a comfortable place to sleep, treating injuries and illnesses, or getting from one place to another. Influential business theorists Clayton M. Christensen built a theory of the jobs to be done based on this fact. His key observation was that the tools and procedures people employ to get these jobs done change much more frequently than the jobs themselves.
Concerning mobility, people changed their primary mode of transportation whenever new technologies – the train, the car, the airplane – allowed and incentivized them to do so. Most recently, we witnessed another reason why people changed the way they got from A to B: the Covid-19 pandemic made some forms of transportation less attractive. In addition, due to health concerns many people travelled far less.
Current data from KOF indicate that the average distance travelled (illustrated by the mobility index) has largely recovered from its low point at the end of March. This allows us to ask interesting questions: Has the pandemic led to sustained changes in the modes of transportation? Do people continue to use bikes and cars instead of public transport?
The data provided by trendEcon shed light on this.We observe how Google search frequencies evolved in the recent past and can compare it to levels in 2019 or 2018. This enables us to test whether Swiss citizens shifted preferences on mobility only temporarily or permanently. In the figure below, we illustrate the results for the keywords “Velo kaufen” (buying a bike), “Auto kaufen” (buying a car), “Bus Ticket”,as well as “Zugticket” (train ticket). In addition, we plot our mobility index together with the one from KOF.
The data indicate a clear short-term impact of Covid-19: interest in bikes peaked while searches for public transport plummeted. More interesting are the lasting consequences of this shock. While still early – the pandemic is not over – we continue to see an elevated interest in bikes. It remains to be seen whether this prevails in the coming months. Similarly, the negative shock to public transportation (buses and trains) still lasts with public interest reduced substantially compared to pre-Corona times.
Covid-19 caused some dramatic changes in people’s lives and mobility preferences.Data provided by trendEconoffers up-to-date insights into key mobility trends.
August 24th, 2020
Stefan Legge
On August 12, 2020 the Federal Council of Switzerland announced that starting in October large events with more than one thousand participants will be allowed again. This marked another round of easing the COVID-19 related restrictions imposed in March. Many companies, sports clubs, and event organizers were relieved to finally see light at the end of the tunnel.
But just because large events are allowed does not mean that people will actually attend them. The number of daily new COVID-19 cases has been on an upward trend for weeks. Many - but not all – people in Switzerland still try to avoid large gatherings. A U.S. study shows that reopening restaurants after lock-downs lead customers to believe that it was safe to eat out again. Similarly, allowing large events may send a signal of safety. So, has the recent announcement led individuals to change their mind?
Using trendEcon, we can see how Google search frequencies evolved in the past days, weeks, or months. As keywords we use “Festival”, “Tickets kaufen” (buy tickets), “Hallenstadion” (a multi-purpose facility in Zurich), “Letzigrund” (stadium in Zurich), as well as “Konzert” (concert). For none of the keywords do the data indicate a positive impact of the recent announcement. It appears that Swiss people have not rushed to find events and buy tickets. There could be many reasons for this muted response: the population is still concerned about the virus (the number of searches for “corona” or “corona symptoms” remains stable at a high level) and the perceived economic situation continues to be worse than before the pandemic hit in late February. Furthermore, organizers of large events still hesitate to plan for 2020. The Hallenstadion Zurich currently lists only seven events for the rest of the year. The coming weeks will show whether the demand for large events increases as Switzerland comes closer to the October relaunch of large events. If not, that light at the end of the tunnel might not be too bright after all.
May 25th, 2020
The first half of 2020 can already be regarded as historic. Seldom before have economies shrunkas fast in such a short time. As a result of COVID-19 and the related government measures, unemployment figures are rising rapidly practically everywhere. Economic performance measured by gross domestic product (GDP) is falling more sharply than we have seen in decades. However, there is still vast uncertainty about how dramatic the economic slump will be and how quickly economies will recover from the crisis.
In Switzerland, annual GDP is expected to fall by around six percent (Seco, April 2020). However, this will not affect all sectors of the economy equally. Restaurants and airports are himuch harder hit than supermarkets or the pharmaceutical industry, for example. While the extremes are quite obvious, many questions remain open.
How quickly, for example, will the demand for durable goods rise again? In recessions, consumers save money, reducing spending especially on clothing, furniture, or cars. Spending in these areas is easier to postpone, which is why these sectors are very pro-cyclical: In a recession they suffer particularly - and with them the advertising industry and, in the next instance, newspapers, which sell fewer advertisements. Consequently, the demand for clothing or cars is also important for many other industries via second- and third-round effects.
The high level of uncertainty poses a problem for both politicians and companies. How much government support is needed and where is it most needed? When will companies again face increasing demand and thus turnover?
Data can help us to improvethe answersto such questions. However, in many case, data first have to be prepared and graphically illustrated. The new platform trendEcon.org created by us aims at exactly this. Every day, Swiss people search Google for countless keywords. Via Google Trends, anyone can see which keywords are currently being searched for very frequently. A look at the terms “WC Papier” (toilet paper) and “Rezession” (recession) is illustrative:
It can be clearly seen here how from the second week of March onwards the number of search requests for “recession” increased. We also observe the large number of people searching for toilet paper on the Internet in mid-March due to a short-term shortage. The concern about toilet paper quickly disappeared, but the topic of recession is still very present.
While such examples are very illustrative, they also highlight some of the problems: Which search terms are actually relevant and how can several terms be combined? How can the data be presented in a clean and comparable way? What are useful benchmarks? We at trendEcon try to address these aspects by selecting the most suitable search terms from a multitude of possible search terms and preparing the data from January 2006 onwards. The latter includes among others a seasonal adjustment as well as the consideration of public holidays.
As a result, trendEcon currently shows not only a crisis index but also the development over time for several sectors. Our main indicator “Perceived Economic Situation” is based on the keywords “economic crisis”, “short-time work”, “unemployed” and “insolvency”. The data based on this provides a picture of the extent to which people in Switzerland are concerned about economic development. The more frequently the four terms are searched for, the worse the assessment of the current situation. The slump from the end of February onwards and the low point shortly after the Federal Council’s decisions of March 16, 2020 are clearly visible in the graph:
The indicator for Perceived Economic Situation includes search terms that reflect people’s worries about the economy. For instance, people then google “economic crisis” (Wirtschaftskrise).
It is also noticeable that sentiment has already brightened considerably again - although the indicator is still below the long-term level. As comparison, one can use the data from 2019 to see the striking differ-ence:
In addition to the overall economic analysis, trendEcon also offers a range of sector-specific indicators. The strong and continuing slump in the travel industry is a confirmation of the quality of the data. Search queries for“city trip”, “book flight” or “cheap flights” (note: we use the German words) are still rare compared to the pre-Corona period:
The category Travel Abroad includes search terms used to book flights and holidays.
We see a similar and continuing slump in cultural events. In contrast, demand for food deliveries or DIY stores is at a (positive) record level.
In summary, trendEcon offers a platform for daily updated information on the state of the Swiss economy. In the coming weeks, we will be adding further search terms and (sub-) indicators in order to constantly increase the amount of information available. In addition, we are constantly testing the usefulness of our data for forecasting economically relevant variables. All data are freely available for Download and the code will be publicly available soon.
If you query Google Trends for a search term, e.g., insolvenz, the result is based on a subsample of all search results.
For a small country like Switzerland, these results may differ quite dramatically from sample to sample.
In order to alleviate the problem, we usually draw 12 or more samples for each series (keyword and frequency). We force Google to re-sample by choosing a different time window.
Google search results are available on a daily, weekly or monthly frequency. As with individual samples, querying Google at a different frequency will lead to substantially different results.
Our goal is to produce long daily time series, ideally from 2006. This is mostly because we want to use the financial crisis of 2008 and 2009 as a benchmark for the Covid-19 crisis. However, Google does not provide daily or weekly data for such a long time period. We circumvent the problem by applying a moving window of daily and weekly queries over the whole time period.
Since the daily, weekly and monthly series are still very different, we want to combine them into a single daily series.
Our next steps are based on the following assumptions:
Monthly data catches the long term trend in search activity in the most accurate way.
Weekly data is best to analyze the searches over the medium term, i.e., over a few months.
Daily data is best to analyze short term behavior over a few days and weeks.
With this in mind, we apply the following methodology. In a first step, we “bend” the daily series to the weekly values, by applying a variant of the Chow-Lin (1971) method. This preserves the movement of the daily series and ensures that weekly averages are identical to the original weekly series.
In a second step, we bend the adjusted weekly series from the first step to the monthly values, using the same method again. This produces a series that maintains most of the movement of the daily and the weekly series, but has the same monthly averages as the monthly series. This series are used for further processing described in the subsequent sections.
Daily series have multiple seasonalities:
There is weekly seasonality : Search activities for business related activities may lower during the weekend.
There is monthly seasonality : If salaries are paid by the end of the month, some kind of shopping may be more likely to occur afterwards.
There is yearly seasonality : Flip flop is an unpopular search term in Winter, while Christmas is rarely looked up in Summer.
Finally, there are irregular holidays that occur at a different dates each year, such as Easter.
We use the Prophet procedure for estimating an additive model where non-linear trends are fit with yearly and weekly seasonality and the holiday effects. The procedure is fully automated and easy to use, but has a few drawbacks. It does not model monthly seasonality and all the seasonal effects are assumed to be constant over time.
In a final step, we use principal component analysis (PCA) to extract the common signal from a group of seasonally adjusted, daily time series. The idea of PCA is to identify several principal components that summarize most of the variance in the data. We then use the first principal component as our index. We manually checked the factor loadings and scores and adjusted the variable selection if needed.
Constructing Daily Economic Sentiment Indices Based on Google Trends.
The data can be accessed here. Our indicator data is public and freely available under license Attribution 4.0 International CC BY 4.0. This means that you can remix, adapt, and build upon this work non-commercially, as long as you credit us and license your new creations under the identical terms.
This project was born at the end of March 2020 as economists were in dire need to obtain timely data to estimate the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on the Swiss economy.
It started as a collaboration between economists working at the data consulting company cynkra, KOF Swiss Economic Institute, the economic forecast division of the State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (SECO), the Swiss Federation of Trade Unions (SGB) and the University of St. Gallen.
We will continue to work on this project along the way and possibly add further indicators.
On Google Trends, you will find series based on a random sample of Google searches conducted in Switzerland. Depending on the time frame you choose, Google returns daily, weekly, or monthly data. We usually downloaded the data 12 times or more times to construct long-run data with a daily frequency. We further adjust the data for seasonal patterns in searches. It is not surprising that searches for gardening are higher in spring. To make meaningful comparisons over time, these seasonal patterns are removed. Finally, our indicators are not based on one single keyword but several keywords are aggregated into one indicator. See Method for further details.
We carefully selected keywords based on expected consumer search behavior. For each indicator, we list the keywords next to the figure in the mini-tab Info.
We try to stick to those keywords that are most likely to reflect the intention to consume certain types of goods and services rather than just having an interest in learning more about them.
You’ll probably still find that not every keyword that one might think of went into our indicator. This is due to the following reasons: First, to ensure privacy, Google Trends does not return search trends based on a small number of searches. Some keywords of interest are therefore censored and return a lot of zeros. Second, other keywords do not show any significant changes over time that coincide with economic activity or changes in demand. These keywords contain no relevant information to go into our indicators. Finally, more is not always better. We use those keywords that correlate strongest with real economic activity.
German is the main language of 63% of the population in Switzerland. Search trends on Google are likely to be representative for the whole economy. Indeed, this is what we find if we compare our indicators to the existing target indicators like consumer sentiment. Due to Google’s privacy restrictions, searches in French and Italian within Switzerland are more often censored than German ones. If keywords are censored, Google replaces observations with a zero and we cannot use the keyword. This is another reason why we opt for using names of stores or brands: these do not depend on the language preferred by the Google user.
We put a lot of effort into constructing daily, seasonally adjusted indicators that correlate with existing economic indicators. They can be used to say something about the evolution of demand for certain consumption categories. However, they remain indicators. We do not measure true economic activity as in number of T-shirts sold on a specific day or money spent on gardening equipment. Also note that this is an experiment in real time. If the correlation between search behavior and consumer demand changes, our indicators may become better or get worse in tracking consumer demand.
The indicators are based on search volumes for chosen keywords. However, the number of searches is unknown, as Google does not share this information to protect users’ privacy. Depending on the indicator, you can interpret the indicators as relative changes over time in interest, concerns, or demand for certain topics, goods, or services. We list the keywords that went into the indicator to facilitate interpretation in the mini-tab Info next to the figure representing each indicator.
The more technical and quantitative interpretation is as follows: all series are normalized such that the long-term equals zero and the standard deviation is one. E.g., an index value of 2 means that search volume for this item is two standard deviations above the average.
The indicators cannot quantify changes in GDP or total consumer demand. Given how the indicators are constructed, it is also impossible to infer growth rates. Google does not share the total number of searches to protect users’ privacy makes it impossible to say something about absolute changes in search volumes.
The data can be accessed here. Our indicator data is public and freely available under license Attribution 4.0 International CC BY 4.0. This means that you can remix, adapt, and build upon this work non-commercially, as long as you credit us and license your new creations under the identical terms.